Intervention requested: Manly Gay

I swear, this set of tropes will be the death of me.

First of all, courtesy link to the discussion of the Hard Gay split: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1296453947043207900&page=1

Hard Gay was decided to be split because it was encompassing two different concepts. The split was designed to make two tropes, my understanding of which as follows:

Manly Gay - Straight Gay that happens to be very masculine/muscular/manly or whatever. Macho Camp - Large, muscular man that acts camp or in an otherwise obviously stereotypically "gay" manner.

Note how I put Straight Gay in that brief description of Manly Gay. That is also in the first post of the Hard Gay split discussion, was what was agreed on, and what the trope was originally written to be, though perhaps the execution not perfect due to writing on my part (as I wrote both tropes as a result of the split.)

Later, I submitted Manly Gay to Image Pickin' due to my opinion of the image being JAFAAC. However, this sparked a lot of confusion as to whether Manly Gay itself was supposed to be a form of stereotype gay (as in, you could just look at a guy and say "Yeah, he's gay") or not. Whether it was due to my writing or due to the additions put in by other tropers, there was some confusion, so I rewrote parts of the trope to fit the original idea, above. Later, Gilgameshkun undid my edits and changed the article to match what he thought the trope should be and to better match the picture he put up.

Ignoring my personal feelings on how this went down, I have a problem with attempting to redefine Manly Gay to be a form of stereotype gay. For one, it essentially turns that trope back to what Hard Gay was originally, thus defeating the entire point of the split. Secondly, it would once again create no home for the Straight Gay examples of the basic idea. Thirdly, it'd be blurring into Macho Camp, which is essentially "stereotypically gay muscle-man".

Regardless of how this is handled, I'd just like a definite end to this. Way too much time has been spent ironing out the problems of these tropes.

I'm really sorry you feel that way, but that's not how I understood Manly Gay at all. My understanding was that Hard Gay had to be split to separate the camp and non-camp elements, but both are non-Straight Gay.

Straight Gay is when a gay character has no specifically stereotypical traits, whether really camp or hypermasculine. A man who is consistently hypermasculine is difficult to take seriously as straight. He's a stereotype in the opposite direction.

Manly Gay is conspicuously hypermasculine gay.
Macho Camp is Camp Gay with muscles, but still very obviously Camp.

edited 3rd Apr '11 2:38:14 AM by Gilgameshkun

Yet your understanding was clearly incorrect, based on the thread that created the two tropes in the first place.

And being gay magically makes it possible for us to take a hypermasculine man seriously? Or, going in the other direction, I can list off several very masculine straight characters that ARE taken seriously, at least seriously enough. That's why there is a difference between Rated M for Manly and Testosterone Poisoning.

I'm saying that, not as an absolute rule, it is hard to take seriously. Just like how you see someone ultra Camp, you wonder if they're gay, and that's why Camp Gay is as established as it is. But in the past, Camp Straight passed much more easily as straight, but it's harder to take seriously today.

Same deal in the masculine direction. If he's macho all the time, I'm more likely to think he's probably gay, whether or not we find them attractive. And it's especially considered common wisdom within the gay community and among straight allies of gay people, that more of the most virulent homophobes are gay themselves. So where there's a lot of homophobes, there are a lot of closeted gay people. *

Straight-acting is when a guy has nothing to prove so doesn't push either in the macho or camp direction. You know, a normal, progressive, non-homophobic straight (or Straight Gay) individual. They blend in and don't give any Gaydar blips.

The current top picture of Manly Gay lights up gaydar like a Christmas tree. At the very least, it's blatantly obvious that the artist is gay.

edited 3rd Apr '11 3:24:12 AM by Gilgameshkun

I contest the idea that if a character is exceptionally masculine, we should (and the average viewer would) assume that he's gay. To use a completely random example, if that were the case, then the majority would assume that Barret from Final Fantasy 7 is gay because he's big, loud, and has a gun on his arm. I can't think of a more obviously masculine character in that game, over-the-top or otherwise, and no one I've ever talked to made the assumption that the FF 7 creators designed him to be gay, Ho Yay and fan fiction aside.

Also, let's keep talk of the picture in the Image Pickin' thread. All I'll say is that whether or not the artist is gay (or female, the fact that the man is clearly sexualized is obvious and there are two demographics likely to appreciate such) has nothing to do with what the picture is showing us...which is just a person standing there.

This is why we need this thread. It's obvious that the two of us are not going to hash this out between ourselves.

Actually, I thought Barret was gay. For Dyne. And then adopted his daughter. And took Cloud on a date (if you alienate Aerith, Tifa and Yuffie). And by Advent Children it was even more blatantly obvious.

Should I remind you that the trope Moustache Of Failed Heterosexuality depends on a hypermasculine characteristic overcompensating to the point of seeming gay? And I recall works like ISO where an Armored Closet Gay character is already figured to be gay by his straight best friend because he's so consistently hypermasculine.

Perhaps older generations didn't have that much of this association, but all the gay (or gay-accepting straight) people I know my age (30) or younger take this as common wisdom. After Tom of Finland, Rock Hudson, Graham Chapman, The Village People, Freddie Mercury, George Michael, Ricky Martin, Gareth Thomas, and countless Real Life examples experienced in our culture, it's become a pretty easy consideration.

edited 3rd Apr '11 3:44:56 AM by Gilgameshkun

I am 24. I think your assertions are extremely unusual and nonsensical.

Armored Closet Gay is also about homophobic behavior and guessing from that, not just being masculine.

Again, we're not going to hash this out ourselves, and I think we've gotten as far as we can. We're obviously not going to see eye-to-eye when our views are so obviously completely opposing.

Well, I did say everyone I know. I don't know where you're from, etc., so I can't vouch for your cultural context. And I do think you're right that we're not going to see it the same way. It's difficult to reconcile your common wisdom with my common wisdom.

Well, if nothing else, we're learning something interesting about the mindset of Gilgameshkun.

Tell me, have you ever thought Arnold Schwartzenegger was gay? How about all the examples on the Rated M for Manly and Testosterone Poisoning pages?

Arnold? I don't know. I mean, he could be bi. But he's really, really iconic, so with someone as media-saturated as him it's really hard to tell. He was from the imagination of a whole generation ago too, and became famous even before I was born. I had my young childhood years in the 1980s, and really grew up in the 1990s. The gay liberation had barely been in the 1970s, and it really took until the 1990s for the older generation to start taking gay people more seriously. Me, I never had that issue, I took gay people seriously even as a preteen. Of course, it helps that I am gay.

Rated M for Manly sometimes trips my Gaydar or Bidar, and Testosterone Poisoning does more often. It's especially funny if a work does a Ship Tease with such characters, or does a Mistaken for Gay or Heterosexual Life-Partners.

Brock Samson from The Venture Brothers comes to mind, especially during the first season finale when a random doctor mistakes Brock as Dr. Venture's lover because of his boytoyish costume. I mean, Dr. Venture himself was dressed like Dr. Frankenfurter, but Brock was very masculinely dressed.

Also Stan Smith from American Dad. Stan's case of Testosterone Poisoning is especially Played for Laughs, so they keep playing around with the concept, including deep french-kissing at least three guys and having two intimate encounters with Roger.

So, very masculine people can be straight, of course, duh. But they trip more Gaydar than someone who isn't so strongly masculine. And the more hypermasculine, the harder they trip it, and the harder it is to take them serious as straight. This extends into my personal experiences too. I don't remember a single heavily masculine "straight" friend who didn't turn out to be gay. I suppose it didn't help that they kept hanging out with gay people. :P

There are tropes like Moustache Of Failed Heterosexuality that I think would not exist at all if not for increased cultural awareness of Manly Gay stereotype. And The Bear is becoming progressively more recognized too. But even tropes like Camp Gay were practically unknown to mainstream culture a century ago. You know the trope Nobody Over Fifty Is Gay? That evolved from a time when people presumed Nobody Is Gay, from a time before the Kinsey Reports and before modern psychology and public school gay-straight alliances, and especially modern acceptance of these things. And past the point of acceptance, comes the recognition of distinctions in that atmosphere of greater openness. There are very masculine men, who in some cultures may have been seen as ordinary, or even act as Heteronormative Crusaders. In another culture those very same kinds of men may not have felt so much cultural pressure, and may have come out as gay, and celebrated their deep masculinity with gay pride. These men become more public, more recognized, more familiar. Then to become straight or Straight Gay is to not be so concerned with this, to simply be an ordinary guy who is unconcerned with whether or not they appear macho.

A lot of that work was done by my parents and older siblings. I was born in 1980 in an environment where, ultimately, no one cared that I was gay. I had the freedom to be Straight Gay, Camp Gay, Manly Gay, or whatever, without stigma — something I knew that a generation before me might not have had, but I was grateful to be given. I think of Straight Gay as being less conspicuously gay overall, and of Camp Gay and Manly Gay as being more conspicuously gay but in extremes of masculinity or femininity. Macho Camp is more towards the feminine end of the spectrum, but the machismo is superficial in the form of well-toned muscles — they can be sexy, but the masculinity can come to screeching halt when it comes to fashion or personality. So while muscles can be a masculine trait, they are superficial and need not extend into outward expressions of masculine character. That's expressed more by personality, expressions, fashions, etc.

...I know it's complicated, but this is what can happen when pigeonholed notions collide with someone's cultural wisdom.

You'll have to excuse my lack of polished paragraph structure. It sucks, I know.

edited 3rd Apr '11 5:47:32 AM by Gilgameshkun

I think I'm with Grakor on this.

Hypermasculinity is definitely not a stereotypical indicator of homosexuality. Maybe it sets off your personal gaydar, but the trope doesn't need to care about what sets off your personal gaydar.

Rhymes with "Protracted."

It's not...? I've always heard that hypermasculinity was a stereotype for someone overexerting their masculinity in order to not seem gay or like The Todd from Scrubs

The Blog The Art

I talked to my dad about this. He quickly knew exactly what I was talking about, and agreed. I asked a bunch of friends, they agreed too. Mousa seems to understand. I'm more sure now than ever.

edited 3rd Apr '11 2:21:04 PM by Gilgameshkun

I'd say it can be, but not in a a way that's considered reliable; more in a joking way, the same way that a guy with a big,overblown SUV with every off-road accessory available may well be accused of "compensating" for having a small penis.

And Gilgameskun, the fact that other people in your close circle of accquaintances agree still doesn't say anything about the presence of that viewpoint in general.

edited 3rd Apr '11 2:26:24 PM by Madrugada

...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.

Wouldn't that be a stereotypical indicator of homophobia then? Or, at the very least, Armored Closet Gay in specific.

I think the point is, hypermasculinity can be considered stereotypical homosexual behavior when combined with other tropes, but it's not a strong indicator in and of itself. Masculine characters are not considered gay by default (to the average viewer) in the same way that camp characters are gay by default. Your average hypermasculine character is still straight until proven otherwise, or some other stereotypical behavior is seen.

Though, I don't think solving this will solve the problem with getting the trope back on track.

edited 3rd Apr '11 2:25:42 PM by Grakor456

Acting hypermasculine to hide your homosexuality is a completely different trope.

edited 3rd Apr '11 2:25:52 PM by troacctid

Rhymes with "Protracted."

I've seen hyper masculinity as a gay stereotype before. It's just not as common as Camp Gay.

Fight smart, not fair.

What's so hard to understand about Manly Gay? It's not supposed to be "Oh, well, that character is suffering from Testosterone Poisoning, so he must be gay". It just happens to be "The character happens to be both hypermasculine and gay". Leather Man and The Bear characters also overlap with them and although sometimes in media they overlap with Macho Camp, in real life, it's quite the opposite.

The whole subculture is originally based as a rejection of the Camp Gay stereotype, being into disco, etc. Manly Gay guys were hypermasculine because that's what they find attractive about men. Granted, that's not so much the idea anymore since even Manly Gay guys can have some Camp Gay in their personality.

Macho Camp, on the other hand, overlaps a lot with Gym Bunny. A gay gym bunny is essentially a character who is only athletic and/or muscular to attract other men. You won't find any body hair or facial hair on these guys because they find it repulsive.

edited 3rd Apr '11 2:43:54 PM by AetherMaster

I think that, judging from the responses so far, we can at least agree that Gilgameshkun's viewpoint isn't universal.

Ultimately, what this boils down to is that the trope was established to be one thing, and then was edit-warred into fitting someone else's viewpoint, which is very uncool to me. Can we agree to have this changed back? It'd also solve the Image Pickin' argument, and we'd finally be done with this one.

Well, I can see that there can be a lot of difference of opinion here. Maybe we consider making this a subjective trope, or at least not say it's Straight Gay by definition, since that's subjective.

^ Not too much about either interpretation of the trope is subjective, so making it a subjective trope would be a bad idea.

I've been there, bud - truly - but in this case I think what we have here is someone seeing in a trope another valid trope that, while different and incompatible than the trope it was sparked from, is still something. "Hypermasculinity as a cover for homosexuality" should probably be a trope on it's on, though it undoubtedly doesn't deserve to derail Straight Gay just for being valid?

A straight split, or should we send the idea to YKTTW?

edited 4th Apr '11 1:02:20 AM by KnownUnknown

"The difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense." - Tom Clancy, paraphrasing Mark Twain.

A split? Hmm, that's something to think about. Maybe something like Conspicuously Manly Gay, or Macho Is Gay? Note that such a man doesn't have to be in the Transparent Closet, or otherwise hiding at all — he's just heavily conspicuous to Gaydar, until confirmed. And such a trope would be most obvious to gay people or straight people with enough gay friends. And also, how would this connect to Moustache Of Failed Heterosexuality? Those moustaches are not unmasculine, afterall, but in fact conspicuously hypermasculine, which I always thought was part of the point.

---

I've given this even more thought, and I realized this type of issue can apply to Camp Gay too — afterall, Camp Gay characters were not always obviously gay to audiences, especially back in the 1940s for example. Maybe something like...Gaydar Tripper or Obviously Gay. Transparent Closet could be a subtrope of that, but being in the closet is not required of the basic concept. In fact, perhaps concepts like Manly Gay and Camp Gay should be independent and not defined by their relation to Straight Gay. If they are not always savvily conspicuous to some audiences, but are to others, then it's entirely possible for someone to be both Straight Gay and Camp Gay, or both Straight Gay and Manly Gay, or to be Camp Gay or Manly Gay but not Straight Gay. But it's the audience (and depending on their particular culture and experiences) who can tell. To say a character is Straight Gay as an invoked characteristic in a story makes that non-subjective, because it's the characters (and not the audience) who have made that distinction. But to judge that someone is Straight Gay or non-Straight Gay by appearances is entirely subjective. Make sense?

edited 4th Apr '11 2:15:15 AM by Gilgameshkun

The way I understand it, Manly Gay has nothing to do with being open about orientation. It's more of an appearance/attitude thing. Armoured Closet Gay and Moustache Of Failed Heterosexuality both seem to cover "being hypermasculine to mask orientation". There's no need to make more tropes for it.

Well, okay, but what about characters who aren't necessarily in the closet but otherwise aren't talking about it either way? What about the audience-perceived Straight Gayness of a character being subjective? From what we've discussed here, I think it would be best to completely divorce Camp Gay and Manly Gay from a definition relative to Straight Gay, since Gaydar may vary by audience or culture.

But the trope doesn't require any application of Gaydar at all, since it only covers characters who are gay in-universe.

Rhymes with "Protracted."